… It’s easy to sit back and pontificate about why so many players are violent, both on and off the field, or how they ended up with ruined lives. We often blamed the players themselves. “They were irresponsible men, or had bad agents, girlfriends, wives who took advantage of them,” we explained. We blamed everything but the game itself for so many ruined lives and serious psychological problems.
… We have all made a very comfortable living off the game and the backs of men like Harry Carson, Tony Dorsett and Junior Seau.
Whoa, look out. The budgets of many universities rest on the recruitment and use of young men as football players.
October 16th, 2013 at 10:49AM
Actually, the budgets of almost zero universities rest on the recruitment and use of young men as football players. That’s the insanity of this topic. College football in the parasitical virus in the flea on the tail of the dog. In most cases, it’s sucking resources away from the academic side, not providing any sort of foundation on which the rest of the university relies. Even at big football schools, football revenue typically represents less than 5 percent of overall university revenue, and has been shown to have little relationship to donations, admissions, and other commonly claimed benefits. Yet, too many people–administrators, faculty, students, alumni, politicians and more–let it wag the dog more furiously every day.
October 16th, 2013 at 11:59AM
GTWMA: I had in mind schools with enormous investments in new arenas, carrying multiple very expensive buyout obligations from fired coaches, seriously dependent on ticket sales and student fees that go to sports — that sort of thing. Of course most big sports schools hemorrhage money rather than make anything from sports, and those who do make money put it right back into sports, etc., etc. But my real point was how deeply in hock sports schools are, and how they depend on their recruits to generate the excitement that at least allows them to pay down their sports-related debts.
October 16th, 2013 at 3:38PM
Margaret,
I also didn’t like that last line. I think you should have said the budgets of many *athletic departments* rest on the recruitment and use of young men as football players (as well as the personal budgets of their coaches).
October 17th, 2013 at 8:35AM
I agree with Pete. It’s the bottom half of the D-I schools/conferences that face the greatest risk. I definitely think there are some subsidizing athletics to such a great extent that they are risking the university credit rating, but the greater risks are to the athletic departments at those places.